While I was in Italy I traveled to quite a few beach towns. Even though it was Spring, barely anything was open, and it was too cold to swim.
Positano
No Italian was swimming in the water. While the Americans were jumping in the water, using bras, underwear, and scarves as bathingsuits (I am not kidding), and drinking boxed wine on the beach. Americans stick out like a sore thumb in Italy.
I decided to do as the Italians do, I suppose. Sit on the beach fully clothed, then walk around the shops.
Positano had a lot of really cute small shops. And the clothing was all so beachy and pastel colored lace. I thought about buying something, but decided I probably won't find myself wearing that particular style of clothing very often.
SHOPPING TIP It's a good idea to look at a clothing item before buying it and imagine where you will wear it. If you can't imagine wearing it to something or some place you will be going to in the next 5 months, take it out of your shopping cart.
To get to the beach in Positano, you have to walk down a lot of steps. I mean A LOT. Not joking in the slightest bit. Everybody's caves started twitching before we got to the bottom. But once we saw the view of this gorgeous town through the cracks of the apartments, we knew it was worth it.
After spending a few hours at the beach, and looking at all the cute shops, we climbed up the hill to the bus stop. The bus ordeal to get to Amalfi was a nightmare. First we had to wait at bus stop for an hour and a half. Which was time we could have spent at the beach. Right before the bus came, groups of people started arrive to also wait for the bus. When the bus finally arrived, it was already half full! People who had just arrived and only waited 5 or so minutes tried to get on the bus before everyone else who had already been waiting for an hour. Very rude, I must say. Do people like this have no compassion? Only care about themselves? Not at all an attractive characteristics in a person.
In the end, my friends and I squeezed on the bus. Standing in the middle of the isles all the way to Amalfi.
